I would recommend Type Fu as a similar alternative that's freemium and offers more features atm. You're not typing code, but it can generate some interesting data, and scales the difficulty level as you improve. It also supports a bunch of different keyboard sets, so if you've always wanted to try learning Dvorak it's a solid choice.
Typing.io: Typing Practice for Programmers
71–79 of 79 posts
Re: Typing.io: Typing Practice for Programmers
#72Learning to type quickly is a valuable skill. But with programming, is typing speed a common bottleneck? It seems akin to learning how to turn a steering wheel more quickly or how to hammer faster.
I think it really depends on your process. If you're efficiently pragmatic , then maybe your work environment includes an IDE with tab-completion, project skeletons, lots of snippets, and plenty of experience tying together existing frameworks and other tech to achieve your goal. On the other hand, some people actually want to do that sort of dirty work (even in verbose environments) because they get an overview of e…
Too late to edit, but if anyone reads this comment later please also see this post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6908248
There's a neat part of the article that might better demonstrate what I'm talking about.
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> Because I was young, super-anal, and wasn't on SSRIs back then, I once asked Carmack why he didn't use libraries for common functions that he could share between engine revisions. Carmack's a super-nice guy, but on this one instance he used the "Well, I think my methods work pretty well..." defense. I never suggested coding style changes again.
> But, really, for him it made no sense to share code, because, like a bee, it was just as fast to write new code. The template was in his head, he types really REALLY fast—why bother importing something?
> Don't take this to mean his code was spaghetti—it was actually some of the easiest-to-understand code I've ever worked with. It has an almost indescribable quality of "obviousness." Like, you know when a really good teacher explains something, it seems obvious? That's what his code was like. I mean, OF COURSE there's a loop where you service the pending events and call a refresh on the UI layer.
Re: Typing.io: Typing Practice for Programmers
#73Re: Typing.io: Typing Practice for Programmers
#74Earlier quoted context omitted.
Slow typing can be very tedious while pair programming, though the tedium is also a function of anxiety and patience.
I admit I'm a terrible pair programmer, so my experience may not be representative, and while I sometimes get frustrated when the person with the keyboard fails to hit the right keys (and to be fair this person is sometimes me!), almost always the main source of frustration is when can't agree on something or when one repeatedly misunderstands the other. On the other hand, when we are on the same page, slow typing is…
hah, i guess i should mention that i am bad at leading because of my own slow typing annoying myself
Re: Typing.io: Typing Practice for Programmers
#75Cool idea and everything, although all that "IDE FTW" comments are partly true. But nevertheless it's cool to read code from different projects while practising at typing.
But, pricing, really? I guess I'll write such an app for myself. Not that $5/month is a lot, but the idea of paying for that is just ridiculous to me.
Re: Typing.io: Typing Practice for Programmers
#76This is really cool. I love the UI and the idea and the execution. I actually learned a lot of Objective-C without Xcode and no autocomplete so it was interesting to see how I've learned to work with Xcode/AC since then, ha.
Re: Typing.io: Typing Practice for Programmers
#77Also, it's really annoying how every new service out there thinks that everybody has google account. You want me to pay for your service and don't even let me register there? Well, I don't have google account. And I never will.
Re: Typing.io: Typing Practice for Programmers
#78Croatian keyboards really suck for coding (http://allixsenos.deviantart.com/art/Croatian-keyboard-layou...).
Re: Typing.io: Typing Practice for Programmers
#79I found this really fun, I tried half the languages there. But why do the lower level languages like C/C++ have actual logic in them (e.g. if/else/||/&& ) while the higher level languages just have module/class definitions?
It's not exactly an apple-to-oranges comparison. Like I just got 100+ wpm in Ruby but what's the point of feeling good about that when it's just typing out a list of symbols over and over again?